unate
manner just described, departed this world. The proposal seemed to
astonish Plushkin, for he sat staring open-eyed. At length he inquired:

"My dear sir, have you seen military service?"

"No," replied the other warily, "but I have been a member of the CIVIL
Service."

"Oh! Of the CIVIL Service?" And Plushkin sat moving his lips as though
he were chewing something. "Well, what of your proposal?" he added
presently. "Are you prepared to lose by it?"

"Yes, certainly, if thereby I can please you."

"My dear sir! My good benefactor!" In his delight Plushkin lost sight of
the fact that his nose was caked with snuff of the consistency of thick
coffee, and that his coat had parted in front and was disclosing some
very unseemly underclothing. "What comfort you have brought to an old
man! Yes, as God is my witness!"

For the moment he could say no more. Yet barely a minute had elapsed
before this instantaneously aroused emotion had, as instantaneously,
disappeared from his wooden features. Once more they assumed a careworn
expression, and he even wiped his face with his handkerchief, then
rolled it into a ball, and rubbed it to and fro against his upper lip.

"If it will not annoy you again to state the proposal," he went on,
"what you undertake to do is to pay the annual tax upon these souls, and
to remit the money either to me or to the Treasury?"

"Yes, that is how it shall be done. We will draw up a deed of purchase
as though the souls were still alive and you had sold them to myself."

"Quite so--a deed of purchase," echoed Plushkin, once more relapsing
into thought and the chewing motion of the lips. "But a deed of such
a kind will entail certain expenses, and lawyers are so devoid of
conscience! In fact, so extortionate is their avarice that they will
charge one half a rouble, and then a sack of flour, and then a whole
waggon-load of meal. I wonder that no one has yet called attention to
the system."

Upon that Chichikov intimated that, out of respect for his host, he
himself would bear the cost of the transfer of souls. This led Plushkin
to conclude that his guest must be the kind of unconscionable fool who,
while pretending to have been a member of the Civil Service, has in
reality served in the army and run after actresses; wherefore the old
man no longer disguised his delight, but called down blessings alike
upon Chichikov's head and upon those of his children (he had never even
inquired whether Chi